A Freshman’s Guide to Surviving their First Semester of College during a Worldwide Pandemic
Allyson Zheng
Instructor’s Introduction
Allyson was in my Fall 2020 WR120 class, thematically focused on women’s writing in translation. This project was her final submission for the “Exercises in Translation” creative assignment, where students are asked to do the following:
- Write a one-page journal entry, on a time you experienced change—internal, external, or (probably) both.
- Then, following Raymond Queneau’s example in Exercises in Style, translate this story to at least two other “genres” of your choice.
- Lastly, include a Translator’s Note of at least one page that explains the “rules” of the genres you translated into, the concepts and words were difficult to “translate,” and how your different forms/genres offered you new storytelling possibilities and/or brought new constraints to your expression. Your note should share specific examples from your work.
After writing a moving piece of short creative nonfiction, Allyson chose two different genres to “translate” into: a renga (a linked Japanese poetic form) and a letter to a friend. Her renga fits the tradition of the form beautifully, avoiding personal pronouns and engaging the natural world; her letter is personable and reflective while following the expectations of the epistolary form. Her Translator’s Note shows how deliberately she carried out these genre translations, and how thoughtfully she applied her learnings on genre and tone to this creative exploration of the highs and lows of the past year-and-change of a global pandemic.
Cecilia Weddell
A Freshman’s Guide to Surviving their first Semester of College during a Worldwide Pandemic
This whole year has been a global obstacle. There’s the coronavirus pandemic, the collective frustration in politics, the upsurge in activism around the world, and continually more horrible displays of climate change, and that is only to name a few. Amidst all of this chaos, I started college this fall, which seems so miniscule compared to everything else that has happened, however, this fall is when I experienced the most change perhaps in my whole life so far. It wasn’t a physical change, but more a change to my relationship with myself. This fall, at 17 years old, I finally learned how to take care of myself.
Last year, like most high school seniors, I overloaded myself with school, work, volunteering, and extracurriculars, and I kept going even after college acceptances. I was constantly stressed and tired, and would always try to use up every second productively: doing the most work, getting the most sleep, spending time with friends, or eating the most food that I could before the next thing in my agenda started. I remember feeling that there simply was not enough time in a day to do everything that had to get done. This fall, however, after a summer filled with wishful anticipation for a new life, I found a way to cheat that old, toxic system.
This fall semester, without the comfort of my home and the close support of my friends and family, I was forced to learn how to take care of myself. At the beginning, when I was first adjusting to living alone, I felt that every day I was just waiting for something to go wrong so I could attempt to fix it. The longer I lived alone, the more I learned how to care for myself, and the more I loved and thrived on independence. Whether it was making sure I ate healthy, exercised, got decent hours of sleep, or took some time every day for myself to do something that made me happy, I learned that balance is just as, if not more important as being a diligent student. Now, I find happiness in the little things, like breathing in the fresh air on my way to a covid test, having the dining hall’s buffalo cauliflower (their best meal in my opinion), or doing some quick morning yoga before class. Doing these little acts of kindness to myself has put me in better moods and leaves me feeling less stressed, which makes me more focused when it comes to working. Unlike last year, I now have time to think, to sleep, and enjoy life, even though I’m just as busy as I was last year, if not busier. It makes me so grateful for these unprecedented covid circumstances, as I don’t think I would have learned these lessons if physical distancing wasn’t mandated, or if classes hadn’t been mostly online.
Nobody has ever written a guidebook about starting college during a global pandemic (probably because there hasn’t been any need to), but at the beginning of the semester, I definitely wished there had been. Now, I couldn’t be more grateful that I learned all of this myself. Even if it doesn’t seem like a big epiphanic change (and of course I’m still learning along the way), this new self-nurturing mindset will help me immensely not just through school, but for the rest of my life.
Translation 1: Renga
Balancing life’s act
Waking up before the Sun
Every second counts
As Spring opens, cities close
Never-ending adjustments
Bittersweet summer
Wishing on a shooting star
Adventure awaits
Novel becomes the routine
An autumn leaf’s solitude
A grateful Winter
Enjoying the fresh breaths of
A more balanced life
Translation 2: Letter/Postcard to Best Friend
Wednesday, November 4, 2020
Dear Yasmeen,
Greetings from Boston to my favorite pen pal!
Today was a sunny day much like this postcard! This picture is looking over Commonwealth Ave at the Marsh Chapel. Right behind it is one of my favorite places on campus, the BU “beach”, which isn’t actually a beach, but if you close your eyes, the sound of the road is kind of wavelike. :o It’s really peaceful, you’d love it!
I’m having a great time here! I hope you are doing well too! I’m fascinated by all the opportunities a big city like Boston has to offer. I’m glad that I’ll have four years here because there’s so much I want to see and look forward to learning! It’s also amazing to see all the efforts being put into making the most out of these circumstances, and despite having mostly virtual classes, I’m still able to interact and meet people from around the country and the world.
Isn’t it crazy that we’re living on our own now? I’m loving the independence of it, and I’m sure you do too! There’s always something that I’m scheduling and reminding myself to do, and I feel like every day I’m just waiting for something to go wrong so I can attempt to fix it. Do you feel that way too? I feel like we’re experiencing the same thing, because we both moved away from home on our own. I’m so proud of us!
Being here has definitely taught me a lot about taking care of myself. I’ve been trying to do at least one thing in a day that is completely for my happiness, such as writing this postcard! I hope you’re taking care of yourself too.
Thank you for the mask you sent! The colours are so cute! I’m going to wear it tonight during my bio lab. How is the covid situation there? I hope everyone is staying safe and not having covid parties.
It feels weird to think how quickly my time here has gone by. I miss you so much and I have so much I want to tell you!
See you in less than 2 months! Love you!
Ally <3
P.S: Hopefully by the time you get this postcard, Biden will be announced president :)
Translator’s Note
The Renga, which is a Japanese poem that translates to “linked verses,” is meant to be a collaboration of a group of different poets, where each poet writes a different stanza. The stanzas alternate between Haiku (5-7-5 syllable lines) and Tanka (7-7 syllable lines) poems. Instead of having each stanza be a contribution of a different poet, my translation was a contribution of different versions of myself throughout the seasons of 2020, starting in January (winter) and ending in December (winter again). It was difficult to condense the ideas from the original with so little freedom into 5-7 syllable lines at a time, while still trying to incorporate seasonal words that are characteristic of Rengas. The more distant, unidentified voice of the translation is less obvious a representation of the original’s voice, since the Renga requires less of a personal, narrative tone. However, I intentionally kept the poem in present tense to simulate each “poet” version of myself writing that particular stanza at that specific time of year. The first line of the translation, “Balancing life’s act” in the present tense indicates that I had yet to find the balance, whereas the last line of the Renga, “a more balanced life” in past tense means that my life has become more balanced than before. The seasonal progression of the poem helped to show the comparison from start to end of the year, which was helpful since I could not explicitly say “I learned that balance is just as, if not more important as being a diligent student” like the original. In another example, the sentences “At the beginning, when I was first adjusting to living alone, I felt that every day I was just waiting for something to go wrong so I could attempt to fix it. The longer I lived alone, the more I learned how to care for myself, and the more I loved and thrived on independence.” from the original, became, “novel becomes the routine” in the Renga. With little words to spare, I wanted to convey that I was starting to get used to the obstacles thrown at me every day and how I gradually adjusted to and appreciated the new environment.
For the translation into a letter/postcard, I incorporated elements such as the date, a greeting, an ending signature, a p.s. note, and mentioned the postcard’s location and picture. I incorporated more casual, conversational language liberally, including exclamation marks, emoticons, and phrases like “I feel” to show the informal aspect of writing to a close friend. It felt easier to preserve the narrative features of the original than the Renga did because I wasn’t at all restricted to the amount of syllables I could use. For example, I translated “when I was first adjusting to living alone, I felt that every day I was just waiting for something to go wrong so I could attempt to fix it” from the original into “I feel like every day I’m just waiting for something to go wrong so I can attempt to fix it. Do you feel that way too?” The question at the end gives it the sense that my close friend could reply back, making it more conversational. The whole translation was in present tense, because when I write letters, it’s more of me writing whatever comes to mind in the moment, rather than a retrospective essay like the original. The mask that I mentioned her sending me was actually real, even though it had no mention in the original. I thought that it could create a more natural transition into mentioning “unprecedented covid circumstances” as said in the original, instead of just directly bringing up the subject, risking it sounding too formal for a letter..
This project has taught me a lot about the intricacies of translation with the constraints of the different forms. Even with the perks of being both author and translator and not even translating into a different language, it was difficult to encapsulate the same essence of the original, often resulting in many back and forth adjustments to both translation and original. For example, the original had no mention of how I felt during the summer before college, however, the Renga needed a summer stanza. To fit the rules of the Renga, I made a slight modification to the content in the original, adding the words “after a summer filled with wishful anticipation for a new life,” which I wouldn’t have been able to do if I hadn’t been both author and translator. I can imagine how much more thoughtful a process it would be for the translator without the immediate communication with the original author. This process has definitely made me gain even more respect for translators, and I’m grateful for having the opportunity to experiment with translation.
Allyson W. Zheng is currently an undergraduate sophomore, majoring in biology, minoring in violin performance and chemistry, and on the pre-med track. Born in Evanston, IL and brought up in London, Ontario, Allyson started her freshman year at BU in the midst of the pandemic.Outside of classes, she is a BU UROP funding recipient working at The Hamilton Lab at the Boston University School of Medicine, studying the cardiovascular impact of Covid. She is also a CAS Dean’s Host and an RA in The Towers. Allyson is extremely grateful to Professor Weddell for encouraging her to reflect on the personal impact of the pandemic and explore the complexity of translated works, as well as for her engaging class discussions and thoughtful feedback.